Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Should Iran be wiped off the map?
I liked Israel's simple ultimatum to the mad cow-infected Iranian. Essentially they said:
"Dude, did you see 'The Gdfather'? Remember the mafiosi summit, where The Don wheezes (sumfinlike):'If anything should happen to my son, should he gets hit by a bus or struck by lightning, then I'm going to blame some of the people in this room.'
"Well, check that scene out, Herr Mahmoud. Think bomb, and I know you often do, but remember who invented it.
"If after you varmints get your hands on one something happens in our neighbourhood and you imagine that running around tut-tutting and crying "waddantmee waddantmee"'s gonna save your sorry ass, you won't have time to think again."
Despite the verbal missiles being lobbed today, Iran has a history with Israel long preceding the birth of Islam and penetrating deep, even, into the Old Testament, into Jewish consciousness and into deep BCE.
The Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar, so the story goes, destroyed the Temple of Jerusalem when they conquered Israel, and the Babylonian empire that ruled Israel then fell to the control of the Persians (read: Iranians).
Then Cyrus the Great, the (Persian/) Babylonian ruler, after being impressed with the depth of Jewish belief in One Almighty G-d (a tenet with kinship to his own faith), ordered the rebuilding of the Temple and the repatriation of the conquered Jews to their homeland.
Babylon/Iran (and Cyrus)'s BCE faith was Zoroastrianism. Islam came much later.
Now I'm absolutely certain that Mahmoud Crazy-Eyes would spin an Islamofascist-approved version of that little story, if you asked him. Say at a Holocaust-Didn't-Happen cocktail party.
And said version would fit, of course, into Mahmoud's Mahmoud-centric worldview, as exemplified in the extracts of the letter sent by the Iranian President to US President Bush recently, as published in the Wall Street Journal.
Inter alia, and none of what follows is made up:
"Those with insight," the Iranian tells Mr. Bush, "can already hear the sounds of the shattering and fall of the ideology and thoughts of the liberal democratic systems. We increasingly see that people around the world are flocking toward a main focal point--that is the Almighty God. . . . My question for you [Mr. Bush] is, 'Do you not want to join them?' ...
Loopy as this sounds, it should be of some comfort to those on the American left who believe Mr. Bush is already a theocrat. But consider some of Mr. Ahmadinejad's other weird diplomatic and historical insights:
- "September 11 was not a simple operation. Could it be planned and executed without coordination with intelligence and security services--or their extensive infiltration? Of course this is just an educated guess."
- "The brave and faithful people of Iran too have many questions and grievances, including . . . [the] transformation of an Embassy into a headquarters supporting the activities of those opposing the Islamic Republic. . . ." That's the U.S. Embassy he's referring to.
- "One of my students told me that during WW II . . . news about the war was quickly disseminated by the warring parties. . . . After the war, they claimed six million Jews had been killed. . . . [Let] us assume these events are true."
The letter also contains repeated references to what Mr. Ahmadinejad imagines, with some justification, are the main concerns of the Western left. It's all here: the exploitation of Africa's mineral resources; homelessness and unemployment in the U.S.; the budgetary wastefulness of the war in Iraq and U.S. fiscal imbalances. The concern is almost touching, though perhaps Mr. Ahmadinejad needs to broaden his daily media sources beyond the BBC.
What's wholly absent, however, is any indication that he is prepared to moderate his positions as a way of meeting the U.S. or U.N. half way. As a psychological comparison, the Unabomber's manifesto comes to mind.
